Trying to save some more Knock Out roses from Tractor Supply ($2)

Update 5/28/2016

Wow! 3 of the 5 lived and they are doing great. One is huge! I wasn't sure what I had actually bought, but I believe 2 of them are Red Drift ground cover roses and the other is the single or maybe semi double pink.

These pictures do not really do the drift roses justice. The new growth, now over 3 feet tall is covered in buds. One of the bushes is at least 5 feet in diameter. It is very full and dense.

One of the three has new growth so I guess this means it is established. Yay (3 of 5 so far). I gave it 6-9-6 fertilizer today (Bayer Advanced 2 in 1). It also has an insecticide in it. Future growth will be protected from bugs. I'm not big on bug sprays, etc., (I know bees are very important too) but one of my other rosebushes is already being eaten by bugs. The two pictures below show the new growth.

There were about 7 dying Knock Out plants at Tractor Supply today. I bought 3 more hoping to save them. $2 bargains. I really wanted to try and save them all! The others didn't seem to have any sign of life remaining. So here they are (I should have taken a picture before I took them out of the package)

There are a few flower buds on the plant pictured in the middle, but they are all on one very thin cane that is an offshoot of the root. The plant pictured last only had one large cane and it is fairly green. The top pictured plant is looking sad.

Here they are after clipping away some dead branches and trying to fix them up a bit (below):

The last picture shows the one small living cane. I had to balance it on the dead branches to keep it off the ground. It does have about 4 flower buds on it, and one is about to bloom.


Two of these plants are Rainbow Knock Out. I'm not sure what the other one (the plant with the large green cane) is because the plastic and label were removed from the pot.

I now have 5 Knock Out rosebushes planted in my backyard. All were near death. We'll see what happens. At least I can experiment with them with love and not fear harming them!  


I also should have taken photos of the roots. I am fairly certain these roses are grown on their own roots (not grafted) They were planted in peat pots (about 6 inches) The roots looked okay. One of them seemed a little moldy.